White Dorper Stud History

In 1999 a decision was made that our then livestock operation was not sustainable. As a family we owned and managed the oldest (flock established in 1888) and one of the most successful Poll Merino studs in Western Australia. Managing a feedlot within our merino operation gave us the inclination to push for a more efficient and profitable meat sheep which then led to a commercial cross breeding programme using White Dorpers.

November 1999 saw us purchase 15 White Dorper rams to not only trial as a terminal option but also to start a gradeup process in our then 7,000 head commercial flock of White Dorpers.

White Dorper lambs came down alongside ewes joined to PD's in April and August 2000. The comparison in the April drop was minimal as most lambs of both crosses were sold off green feed by October. It wasn't until the August drop lambs entered the feedlot that the extremes were realised. The White Dorper's ability to take to feed of all descriptions and environments and move forward is remarkable.

In 2004 an opportunity arose to purchase an existing White Dorper stud. We purchased 240 Saxon Downs stud White Dorper ewes which provided us with the nucleus for our full blood programme today.

The Saxon Down White Dorper stud, established by Gordon Palmer in 1998, quickly became a leading stud with sales throughout Australia and overseas. Mr Palmer imported significant numbers of some of the highest quality White Dorper embryos brought to Australia.

At Haseley in the years 2005, 2006 and 2007 extensive Embryo Transfer programmes have resulted in a stud flock of 4,000 full blood White Dorper ewes. These successive ET programmes were completed with our top 25% of White Dorper ewes in each season which has given us the absolute best opportunity in achieving the highest quality flock.

Introduction of carefully selected genetics is used to support our intense measured performance based within stud selection.

Today our business has approximately 5,000 full blood White Dorper ewes and 8,000 gradeup White Dorper and Dorper ewes.